Perception
by Jaganashi
Summary: ."One of my idols once said that anger dwells only in the bosom of fools. And who am I to discount the words of dear Albert Einstein? I fear that in the future, I will be irrevocably sorry. For at this moment, I've never been more foolish."


_One of my idols once said that anger dwells only in the bosom of fools. And who am I to discount the words of dear Albert Einstein?_

_I fear that in the future, I will be irrevocably sorry. For at this moment, I've never been more foolish._

_

Raphael once said that the world goes red, painted in the blood that he's about to spill. At the time I hadn't thought much of it, other than to muse on his poetic phrasing. Now, now I am seeing through the same borrowed eyes of crimson. In the back of my mind, a cold and quiet prison, I marvel at the chemical reactions taking place that incur such a drastic change of perception. How strange it is, that the sprays of blood are still so prominent against the red tint. There are several tricks of the mind occurring; surely the snap of a spine can't possibly channel through my bo to stroke at some hidden pleasure core. And one would have to assume that there are screams among the masses, painful and piteous, yet I hear nothing in the eerie calm of my mind.

Images of my brother flit behind my eyes, yet do nothing to impair my vision as I strike blow after blow.

_It had been a small mob, as far as mobs go. Frightened and angry men, mostly, shouting obscenities about alien scum. My voice had called out, so clear yet so foreign to me now, "Try not to hurt anyone. They don't know any better!"_

That couldn't have been me. It isn't me. At least, not what I've become.

_Clearing a path to a fire escape ladder had been simple. But then, so was pulling a trigger. Below me, Michelangelo fell to the ground. His eyes were incredibly wide, as if more surprised by the action than the pain that had followed. I had pushed off from the wall without thought, knocking the gun from a nearby hand. I had then opened my mouth to yell sense at them, if only to buy Mike some time to recover, but a cracking pain shot through the back of my skull._

My hands are starting to slip along the slicked bo, but it doesn't slow me down. I'm trapped in some kind of nightmare where I cannot hear, cannot feel, cannot stop. But I can see. The bodies that litter the ground, the face full of triumph from a bloody knife that soon crumples in lifelessness. There's a sea of humans, dead and alive, that I will tear through until I see my rock of green and orange. Would I even be able to register the colors from beneath this tint of crimson? Have I already missed him in this cold rage?

_I must have been out for mere seconds, because a throbbing head was the only pain that greeted me. Ten feet away, Mike was up and fending people off while trying to protect the thigh riddled with widening streams of blood. The crowd was like a suffocating force, preventing either of us from moving or reaching our cells. We were calling out to one another for support as we tried desperately to cut back toward the fire escape. The yells and jeers of the men overpowered his voice, the sudden lack of it making me panic. After several minutes that passed like hours, I had been granted a passing glimpse between bodies. _

_I had to lower my eyes, for he was no longer standing. Or moving. Or reacting at all to the pummeling that was raining down upon him. Something snapped with the synapses firing information through my brain; the world bled from inward out and my thoughts became unnaturally still._

I am unsure and uncaring as to where my staff has disappeared to. Bones crack against my knuckles and beneath my heels. Windpipes collapse in my palm. The only blows that I deliver are killing, yet there is always another in my way. They are no longer men or even bodies, but target points. A skull to the right, a throat to my left- that is all that I can see. I do not even wonder where the rest of the world has gone, nor why a solar-plexus that I strike seems to be protected by armor. It has a trachea, though, unprotected and giving beneath my blow.

As it turns out, green is indeed indistinguishable from the world that bleeds red.


End file.
